The Fire, Pebble Grave Gift and Keeping it all together ...

Saturday afternoon at my sister's farm. My sweet great niece and her 5 year old sweet cousin,

toast marshmallows on the ends of willow sticks, on the same fire that burns up all  Robin's old cheque books,

and the mountain of financial papers I have been clearing out,

and which are too many to shred.

 Over the years he loved the many fires we all used to sit around on special occasions at the farm - birthdays and anniversaries and coming of age ceremonies. Me too. I never dreamed there would ever be a fire such as this - his money history disappearing in smoke and ashes.  

 But it makes it so much easier to share it with the sweet marshmallow eaters who he loved to bits.

On Sunday I walk in wind and rain to his grave. In my ruck sack are two pebbles taken from the beach at Budleigh Salterton. Actually I took them from our garden. They were here  in a pile of others when we moved in nearly 14 years ago. Technically it is against the law to remove pebbles from the beach at  Budleigh. You'd be fined if caught.  But I think everyone does  - they are irresistibly smooth and beautiful when washed by the waves. And so satisfying to tumble in your pocket.

I've decided that they are a more sustainable grave gift than perishable flowers.

I stole this tiny tete-a-tete daffodil from a wild clump under a tree at the cemetery. But it blew away in an instant.....across the sticky red clay and long grass.

 Today.

I have bad dreams all night - complicated, anxious, confusing .....I've made some huge gaff at  someone's wedding....the groom is furious with me.....I can't be forgiven.... I'm wandering in the gardens of some huge glamorous hotel where the reception is being held..... looking for a way out..... separated from the people I know.....getting hopelessly lost in long avenues of trees.

I can't find a reason to get out of bed this morning. My class is cancelled. I'm not ill. I'm not thirsty or hungry. I'm not tired.

 No sunshine filtering through the curtains to pull me out. No appointment. No appetite for all the tasks on my to-do list.  

I don't want anything. Except to feel something other than this pointless going-through-the-motions habit of keeping it all together. Keeping myself together.

After a while I do get up. Some little voice telling me off in my head. 

And when I've sliced the lemon for my hot tea .....and reviewed my non-urgent action list .....and received some good news about a parcel that I thought was lost in the post.....and remembered that I need to make soup....and remembered that I'm lucky to be alive....it just gets easier to go though the motions.

 And to give up looking for some mythical point of it all.

So I  just savour the crunchiness of the roasted hazelnuts sprinkled over my boiled egg, leek and purple sprouting broccoli lunch.....one small mouthful at a time.....trusting my appetite for my life will return when the time is right. Maybe when it isn't raining.